A "Second Opinion" Regarding Implementation
of the Nebraska Partnership for Quality Education Project

A Report to The Nebraska
Board of Education

September 9, 1999

George K. Cunningham, Ph.D.
College of Education
University of Louisville

J.E. Stone, Ed.D.
College of Education
East Tennessee State University

Martin Kozloff, Ph.D.
Watson School of Education
University of North Carolina - Wilmington

all of the Education Consumers Consultant Network

At the request of Ann Mactier--member of the
Nebraska Board of Education--the Nebraska Partnership
for Quality Education proposal was examined by
the above members of the Education Consumers Consultant
Network. The Education Consumers Consultants Network
is a network of education professionals associated
with the Education Consumers ClearingHouse <www.education-consumers.com>
and the report is a product of its "Second Opinion"
service--an independent consultation service that
serves education's consumers exclusively.

The material reviewed was presented to the Board
at an August 1999 meeting and action is to be
taken at the Board's September 1999 meeting. These
time limits posed substantial limitations on the
nature and extent of the following analysis.

Overview

The commitment and effort that went into the
writing of the NDE proposal is evident. The
authors of the proposal are to be commended
for successfully securing the participation
of the most important organizations involved
in teacher education in the state of Nebraska.

The proposal includes a series of strategies
that have been developed to improve programs
for educating teachers. It is the purpose of
this report to consider those strategies with
regard to their likely effectiveness and to
make suggestions about possible alternatives
or additions where appropriate.

This is a conventional proposal and the strategies
that are recommended to improve teacher education
are similar to those that might be proposed
in other states. From that perspective, this
is a safe document. If the Nebraska State Board
of Education is fairly satisfied with the quality
of its teacher education programs and the present
level of student achievement, the proposed modifications
to the Nebraska pre-service teacher education
may result in a satisfactory level of small
improvements. On the other hand, if the Board's
primary aim is to significantly improve the
ability of Nebraska teachers to bring about
measured academic achievement, the proposed
strategies are unlikely to be adequate and for
the following reasons:

Findings

The parties who will implement the Nebraska
Partnership for Quality Teacher Education Project
(hereinafter called the Project) are the same
institutional and organizational stakeholders
who are responsible for the current state of
teacher training in Nebraska. They are assessing
themselves, they are proposing to reform themselves,
and they plan to assess and report the outcome
of their efforts. By contrast, it is standard
practice within the business community for independent
outside auditors and examiners to review and
report the performance of business organizations.
Too, outside leadership is typically required
to produce any real change--especially in instances
where the quality of organizational performance
is in question.

One of the inherent limitations of an attempt
by stakeholders to reform and improve themselves
is that truly fresh ideas are very unlikely.
Stakeholders have accustomed ways of conducting
business. They have vested interests as well.
Under the proposed plan, there is a very great
likelihood that any changes will end up being
quite similar to existing practice. For example,
the new "performance based" NCATE
Standards that the Partnership proposes to adopt
are entirely consistent withthe current programs
standards that now govern most teacher education
programs in Nebraska. They are also entirely
consistent with the pedagogical concepts now
popular among teacher educators and, significantly,
there is little evidence to suggest that teachers
trained in programs under either the current
or the new standards do a superior job of boosting
student achievement. If the Board wants new
ideas about how teachers should be trained,
it would be well advised to open up teacher
training educators from outside the Partnership.

One way to open teacher training to fresh ideas
would be to permit schools to train their own
teachers. As schools become increasingly accountable
for student achievement, they take an increasing
interest in insuring that their teachers are
equipped with demonstrably effective teaching
methodologies. For example, the Chicago Public
Schools found that schools facing the prospect
of being reconstituted for lack of academic
progress managed remarkable improvements with
the help of result-oriented private sector consultants.

Given that the Project has funding available
for in-school mentoring programs, the Board
might consider assisting local school districts
in hiring consultants who could train and mentor
individuals who have a bachelor's degree in
the liberal arts. The Houston (TX) Independent
School District, for example, has an alternative
teacher certification program in which such
individuals can enter teaching by completing
a one year internship, passing certain basic
exams, and taking 12 credit hours of college
work. The same consultants would be able to
provide professional development training to
inservice teachers. Such a program would produce
local personnel who are trained in locally used
methods and trained for known local job openings--an
attractive alternative to the present to programs
that train numerous teachers in educational
specialities for which there is an existing
oversupply.

Without competition from outside the Partnership,
neither the Board nor local schools are likely
to learn whether there are more effective forms
of training. Neither are they likely to learn
whether there are less time consuming and less
costly forms of training.

The primary objective of the law under which
the Project was funded--Title II of the Higher
Education Act of 1998--is improved student achievement.
The present Project calls for improving teacher
training but it is not clear that the proposed
improvements will increase student achievement.
Rather the Project's "overall purpose"
is simply said to be the improvement of teacher
education. "Improved teacher education"
could mean improved student achievement; but
as a recent study by Public Agenda suggests,
there may be very significant differences between
the Board's understanding of improved teacher
education and the teacher training community's
view. Noted on page 31 of the Project proposal,
Public Agenda's Different Drummers: How Teachers
of Teachers View Public Education (Farkas &
Johnson, 1997) not only found differences between
teacher-educators and the public but "great
disparities" between teacher-educators'
views and those of K-12 teachers.

The meaning of "improved teacher education"
is not the only expression that might be understood
very differently by the Board and by the teacher-education
community. Two recent opinions by the Nebraska
Attorney General found several of the terms
used in the standards around which the Project
is built--i.e., the standards of the National
Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education
and those of the Interstate New Teacher Assessment
and Support Consortium--to be "unconstitutionally
vague." In light of these findings alone,
the Board would be wise to insure that its understanding
of the nature and aim of the present Project
is shared by its various participants. For example,
would participants agree that the primary objective
of the Project is to strengthen the ability
of newly trained teachers to increase objectively
measured student achievement?

The differences in the vision of education
had by teacher-educators and the public, and
the vagueness of terms such as "improved
teacher education" are indirect reasons
why the Board should seek to clarify the aims
of the proposed Project. The Project's emphasis
on increasing "diversity," however,
is a more direct indication that its top priority
may not be improvements in measured academic
achievement.

The proposal approved by the U.S. Department
of Education appears dedicated to the proposition
that increased "cultural" and "ethnic"
diversity is key to improved teacher quality.
The Project asserts that "Many research
studies suggest that students of color benefit
significantly from teachers of their [own] cultural
background" (page 6). This quote can easily
be understood to mean that there is sound empirical
evidence demonstrating a significant relationship
between the ethnic or cultural background of
a teacher and the academic success of "students
of color." In fact, however, a review of
the National Association of State Boards of
Education document on which this claim is based
reveals that the expected benefits are outcomes
such as closer ties with local racial/ethnic
communities and similar matters, not increased
academic achievement. In other words, the premise
on which so much of the Project appears to be
based--i.e., that improved teacher diversity
will substantially benefit students--turns out
to be a reference to non-academic benefits.

The non-academic benefits that might be derived
from greater teacher diversity may have substantial
merit but they are not reflective of the public's
(or likely the Board's) primary expectation
with regard to schooling. Rather, as repeatedly
affirmed by public opinion studies, schooling
that fails to improve student achievement is
not considered acceptable regardless of whatever
else it is said to produce.

Given that there may be a discrepancy between
the Board's aims and those intended by the Project,
the Board would be well advised to carefully
define the manner in which the Project's expected
results are measured. By doing so, the Board
would have some assurance that whatever the
vagaries of interpretation and implementation,
outcomes would be consistent with Title II's
intended purposes.

Presuming that its top priority is improved
student achievement, the Board may want to consider
assessing the effectiveness of newly trained
teachers by measuring the achievement gains
of their students during their first year of
teaching. A methodology for assessing such gains
called the Tennessee Value Added Assessment
System (TVAAS) has been used in Tennessee since
1993. Other states and districts are either
considering it for use or have adopted it on
a limited scale. TVAAS provides teachers, principals,
and superintendents annual reports of the increases
in student achievement exhibited by the students
for which a teacher was responsible during the
preceding year. TVAAS uses a sophisticated statistical
methodology to calculate an estimate of teacher
effectiveness that is much like the estimates
teachers informally make of themselves, i.e.,
it compares the increase in achievement made
by students in the current year to the record
of increases made by the same students in previous
years. In essence, TVAAS defines excellent teachers
as those who help their students to improve
the most. By contrast, standards-based systems
of teacher and school assessment compare year-end
student achievement levels to a fixed standard
regardless of how much students had to gain
in order to reach the standard. With fixed standards
some students may make important gains without
reaching the standard and others may reach the
standard without much gain.

Both fixed standards and value-added gain scores
are necessary to a complete assessment of teacher
and school performance. Fixed standards tell
policymakers about the quality of the finished
product. They are appropriately used to judge
whether a student should be promoted to the
next grade or graduated. Value-added scores
tell them how well teachers and schools are
working to produce a high quality product. Of
particular importance with respect to the present
Project, the value-added scores of novice teachers
are telling indicators of how well they have
been trained to produce achievement.

The use of value-added assessment as the prime
indicator of a novice teacher's classroom effectiveness
would eliminate many of the uncertainties associated
with the proposed Project. No matter how pedagogical
terms might be interpreted or programs implemented,
those teachers who were successful in increasing
achievement would be identified as effective
and those who were unsuccessful would not be
so identified--no matter how many courses taken
or no matter what their scores on tests of pedagogical
knowledge.

In Tennessee, value-added assessment system
is used in all public schools. It is a significant
(but not unreasonable) expenditure but it provides
statewide public school accountability. Value-added
assessment employed only for Nebraska's novice
teachers would necessitate analysis of existing
student achievement test data but only for those
students taught by novice teachers--a very modest
expense. The advantage of such a program would
be that policymakers and school administrators
would not have to rely on measures of teacher
preparedness such as classroom observations
by teacher-educators or scores on tests that
have an uncertain relationship to student achievement.
Instead they would be able to assess teacher
preparedness for themselves.

If the Board were to decide in favor of using
value-added assessment instead of developing
or adopting a new test of pedagogy--as urged
by the NDE proposal--the overall cost of assessing
teacher preparedness would likely be in the
range contemplated by the present proposal.
Also, if the Board were to use an off-the-shelf
examination of teacher content knowledge--the
PRAXIS, for example--a net reduction in the
cost of teacher assessment might be achieved.
Both of these possibilities would need to be
explored beyond the current report.

Information regarding value-added assessment
may be obtained from Dr. William Sanders of
the Value-Added Research and Assessment Center
at the University of Tennessee. Information
regarding the PRAXIS examination may be obtained
from Educational Testing Service.

Summary

The Nebraska Partnership for Quality Education
has assembled a conventional proposal for NDE
Grant Proposal. The Education Consumers Consultant
Network was asked to render a second opinion
about this project. The perspective taken in
this second opinion was to evaluate this proposal
from the viewpoint of the "consumer"
rather than the teacher education community.
In general, the NDE proposal places a great
deal of emphasis on the importance of modifying
the process of teacher education. Less emphasis
is placed on the outcome. Since a primary role
of teachers Nebraska is to increase the achievement
of the Nebraska Academic Content Standards,
it would seem that a focus on outcomes rather
than process would be a better choice for evaluating
the effectiveness of teacher preparation in
this state. Value-added methodology was presented
as an objective and demonstrably effective way
of accomplishing this purpose.

The adoption of a value-added strategy for
measuring teacher preparedness would entail
expense not anticipated by the proposal but
any added expense would be offset by the lessened
need for the development of new tests. Off-the-shelf
tests of the content are also available. The
cost of developing new tests both in actual
expenditures and in the difficulty of achieving
a consensus regarding the content of these tests
may render them unworthy of the effort. If the
focus of the Project were shifted to student
achievement gains, the impact of the proposed
reforms would become far more visible to the
Board and to the public than is otherwise likely.